A Dreadful Fear of God
Renewing Your Mind
Ligonier Ministries
4.8 • 5.3K Ratings
🗓️ 10 June 2026
⏱️ 26 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
By nature, our sin drives us away from God, terrified of being exposed to His holy judgment. Today, Michael Reeves explains that this repulsing, sinful fear of God arises from a misunderstanding of who He is.
Get Michael Reeves' video teaching series The Fear of the Lord on DVD with your donation. You'll also unlock digital access to all 8 messages and the study guide: https://gift.renewingyourmind.org/
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Meet Today's Teacher:
Michael Reeves is a Ligonier Ministries teaching fellow, president and professor of theology at Union School of Theology in Wales, and host of the podcast Delighting in the Trinity.
Renewing Your Mind is a donor-supported outreach of Ligonier Ministries. Explore all of our podcasts: https://www.ligonier.org/podcasts
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | When people become simply afraid of God, they'll never entrust themselves to Him. |
| 0:07.8 | They must turn elsewhere for their security. |
| 0:12.2 | People with this sinful fear of God will not trust in Christ for their salvation. |
| 0:18.8 | They'll look elsewhere. |
| 0:31.6 | Music Christ for their salvation. They'll look elsewhere. You know, when we talk about the fear of God, there is a great deal of misunderstanding. Hello and welcome to the Winstey edition of Renewing Your Mind. |
| 0:34.6 | We are pleased to share with you messages from the series, |
| 0:38.2 | The Fear of the Lord, is by Ligadier Ministries Teaching Fellow, Dr. Michael Reeves. |
| 0:43.4 | If we believe the lie that we're to be afraid of God, we'll actually run from him. |
| 0:48.8 | And as you'll hear today, just because people run from God, |
| 0:52.6 | doesn't necessarily mean that they're running from religion. |
| 0:57.9 | We all know fear. |
| 1:00.4 | When you experience fear, your body reacts. |
| 1:05.4 | You feel the adrenaline as your heart races, your breathing accelerates, your muscles tense. |
| 1:15.1 | And sometimes that can be intensely fun. |
| 1:18.3 | You think of the rush of the roller coaster or the big game. |
| 1:23.4 | Sometimes it can be terrifying as panic grips you so utterly that you cannot think but only shake, sweat and fret. |
| 1:37.0 | Now underneath those bodily experiences are common thoughts. We fear when we encounter something we cannot control. |
| 1:50.8 | We fear when we face the prospect of either losing something that we love or experiencing |
| 1:59.5 | something bad. |
| 2:02.9 | We even fear when we face the prospect of gaining something wonderful, |
| 2:12.0 | when that thing seems too impossibly wonderful for us. |
| 2:18.3 | And drilling to the bottom of the matter, |
... |
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